Walking on water is impossible. It doesn’t just sound impossible. Take anyone on the planet and plop him out of a boat on the the surface of water and he will sink. There is one exception to that rule, isn’t there? Jesus was out walking one evening. It was a dark and stormy night. It’s one thing to be sipping tea and reading a book while the rain pitter-patters against the pane of glass next to your softly crackling fireplace. Quaint, isn’t it? Jesus skipped the quaint for the thunderstorm. He was out walking in the rain and the wind on the water. He was walking on water in the worst circumstance you could think of!
The setting for this story is odd enough, but Jesus likes to up the ante always. He called for Peter to JOIN him on the surface of the water in the middle of the thunderstorm. Why is this specific situation worse than being in a normal thunderstorm on land? On land you might be struck by the rogue tree branch spurred on by a gust. On a body of water that wind whips up waves! I know what you’re thinking – no one wants to get sea sick while our for a relaxing evening stroll in said thunderstorm. Yes, that would be bad. What’s worse is that waves have a nasty habit of breaking and crashing. Peter might easily have been knocked off his feet by a wave taller than he was!
The so what of this story is that manyfold. First I suppose is the observation that even the wind and the waves obey Jesus. Jesus is the Lord of creation. The second might be that Jesus uses that power to protect his children. Moving on, I suppose the chances of you being exposed on a body of water to a thunderstorm are very low. The chances of you being one of the many storms of life is quite high. I would venture to guess that over the course of the next month, there will be some calamity that we double over your soul with pain or guilt or anxiety or… You get the picture.
Please click HERE to find the handout for the lesson.
Please click HERE to watch the video account of walking on water. The Bible class lesson is below.
Please click HERE to watch the rest of the lessons from The Bible as shown by the History Channel.